It's become one of the most-often repeated football aphorisms: "Offense wins games, but defense wins championships."
But how many championships did the UNM football team win in Rocky Long's defense-oriented program?
While UNM ranked 45th in total defense last year, the Lobos were bottom dwellers when it came to offense. Try 84th overall. Just to get an idea of how horrendous UNM's offense was, consider this: After putting up 70 points on San Diego State - a fluke considering the Aztecs are traditionally one of the worst teams in the conference - the Lobos were held to 46 points during their season-ending four-game losing streak. Not to pile on, but that's an average of 11.5 points per game.
Not surprisingly, in a conference where the top-three finishers - Utah, TCU and BYU - averaged 34.9 points per contest, the Lobos couldn't compete, finishing at the bottom of the heap with 4-8 overall and 2-6 in the conference.
Apparently, offense is crucial to college football teams' success.
Florida, which went on to win the national championship, scored exorbitantly, as did its opponents in the championship game. Both representatives in the BCS National Championship averaged confounding numbers that made viewers wonder, "Is the defense even on the field?" Oklahoma, which led the nation in scoring offense, piled up 51.1 points per game, while the Gators checked in at third with 43.6.
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Still, head coach and offensive mastermind Mike Locksley said he doesn't necessarily agree that college football has become all about offense.
"It's said that offense sells tickets," he said. "But I still believe that championships are won playing really good defense. There's some teams that play in BCS game year in and year out that are some of the top defenses in the country."
But isn't the objective in football - as John Madden often told viewers - to score the most points? And whoever scores the most points wins?
Not necessarily.
In UNM safety Ian Clark's eyes, offense and defense complement each other. One's success dictates the other's.
"You can't have a dominant defense and not score points," Clark said. "You can't have a dominant offense and not prevent points."
Still, even Clark admitted that much of the Lobos' success this year is predicated on them "scoring some points."
And there couldn't come a better year in which UNM's offense will have to shoulder more responsibility for the outcome of games. This year's defensive squad is depleted, having lost eight starters, including its two best cornerbacks in DeAndre Wright and Glover Quin.
"That's going to be a huge factor, especially (since) our competing corners are all redshirt freshmen," Clark said. "We can't shelter these guys. We can't play cautious football, because when you do that, you lose."
That, and when you play cautious offense.
What the Lobos will need this year is something quite simple: balance. However, that word is used too often, and most times it's misconstrued. So what does it mean to Locksley?
"Balanced to me isn't running 50 percent of the time and throwing 50 percent of the time," Locksley said. "It's being able to do both really well when you have to."
Perhaps coaches need to rethink the aphorism, then. College football is mostly about offense, and when the defensive unit stops the opposing offense, it's an added incentive.
Offense doesn't win games, and defense can't win championships if the offense is heavily reliant on the defense, as was the case with the Lobos last season. And vice versa.
"My big goal is to make sure that all three phases of our program are able to carry their weight," Locksley said.
